Democrats

Much has been written recently about the country’s huge disappointment in the Democratic-controlled Congress, which continues to enable the dysfunction of Imperial President George Bush.

Congress has an 11 percent approval rating, according to one poll. More Republicans approve of the “work” Congress is doing than Democrats. The Republicans effectively own the Democrats right now. The Democratic majorities in the House and Senate are not large enough to counter ultra-conservative Democrats, such as U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (California), who has emerged as a Bush sycophant.

As Salon.com blogger Glenn Greenwald points out, Feinstein is the face of what is discouragingly wrong with the Democratic Party right now. She is a 74-year-old politician with absolutely nothing to lose politically. She represents California, a blue state. She is filthy rich. She could and should retire tomorrow and live a life of luxury. So why does she vote consistently with Republicans against her own party’s base? How does such a person qualify herself just in terms of consistency and logic alone?

As Greenwald points out, “What is so notable — and most revealing — about this is that Feinstein is a Democratic Senator from one of the most liberal states in the country. Conventional wisdom holds that she is a ‘liberal’ or at least a moderate. She came onto the national scene in the 1980s as the Mayor of San Francisco, one of the most liberal large cities in the nation, and was twice re-elected by San Francisco residents. In fairness, she casts some (usually futile) votes in favor of the standard Democratic agenda on issues such as the environment, gun control and the Military Commissions Act. And she’ll listlessly participate in investigations that go nowhere, even when the White House defies or outright ignores subpoenas. But what she does with the greatest conviction is supports right-wing Bush measures and, above all else, is an ardent defender of the Beltway power establishment.”

Last week, she voted to condemn the anti-war organization, Moveon.org, for running an advertisement critical of Gen. David Petraeus, the commanding general in Iraq, who recently pushed Bush and GOP talking points when he testified about the occupation. She has voted to ban habeas corpus in this country. Her husband is a defense contractor. She is a typical Beltway politician who is not distinguishable from most Republicans. She possesses no moral center in her politics.

Along with Feinstein, here are the Democratic Senators who voted against the basic concept of free speech in America by condemning the Moveon.org for publishing an advertisement critical of Petraeus: Max Baucus, Evan Bayh, Ben Cardin, Thomas Carper, Bob Casey Jr., Kent Conrad, Byron Dorgan, Tim Johnson, Amy Klobuchar, Herb Kohl, Mary Landrieu, Patrick Leahy, Blanche Lincoln, Claire McCaskill, Barbara Mikulski, Ben Nelson, Bill Nelson, Mark Pryor, Ken Salazar, John Tester and Jim Webb.

These politicians have enshrined Petraeus as the quintessential Military Man of Integrity. In October, 2008, when he spouts more lies to Congress right before the elections, the Democrats will not be able to say a thing about him. You cannot celebrate a person’s integrity and then question his/her veracity later. It is simple logic.

All of this is quite discouraging, of course, and many Democrats are now pondering this personal question: Do I bail on the Democrats and become an independent knowing this may well give the 2008 national elections to the Republicans or do I stay and fight to reframe the values and ideals of the party?

Here is the only answer to that question: Fight. Fight to defeat politicians like Feinstein—and all the Democrats who voted against free speech last week—within the structure of the party. Defeat them in primary elections with real Democratic candidates. Californians could also urge Feinstein to retire. Only a Democratic sweep in the 2008 national elections will prevent this country from adopting some type of totalitarian government, which will no doubt be called “Thompson’s Freedom Pact” or some similar distorted slogan. Only a Democratic president and wider Democratic majorities in the House and Senate will stop the insidious extremism and intellectual reductionism of the neoconservatives.

In Oklahoma, one of the reddest of red states, this dilemma is exasperated tenfold. The corporate media here works openly to stifle real political debate. Yet there are brilliant points of light even here. For example, State Sen. Andrew Rice (D-Oklahoma City) is running against GOP tyrant U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe. Rice is a true progressive who has opposed the Iraq occupation from the beginning. He represents a new generation of Democratic politicians who want to restore the integrity and the “difference” of the party when compared to the Republicans.

And it is okay to vent despite the weird arguments of people like Randi Rhodes, the Air America radio show host who would not allow her callers on Friday to complain about how Democrats voted with Republicans to stifle free speech. (She made quite a spectacle of herself, throwing out the f-bomb in the process.) It is paramount we mount massive campaigns to get politicians like Feinstein removed from office because we must change the party’s direction. But we must not ever forget this is part of the larger effort to fight Republicans, stop the occupation, restore fiscal sanity to government, provide decent health care to Americas, raise stagnant wages and bring back habeas corpus.

(Click here to donate a few dollars to help the Oklahoma Democratic Party.)

The Oklahoma Democratic Party has launched an online fundraising drive and its chairperson, Ivan Holmes, says the party has to “get back to the grassroots” if it wants to win in the 2008 elections.

According to Holmes, in a recent email, “For too long many Democrats have spent their time fighting one another instead of putting aside petty differences to do the work that is needed to elect Democrats. First and foremost, we must remember that we are a family that is over a million strong and together we can win every election in Oklahoma. All families have their disagreements, but only by joining together will the men, women and children of Oklahoma have a chance at a better life with good-paying jobs, access to quality healthcare, and a strong educational system.”

Holmes makes a great point. Democrats have the numbers in Oklahoma (“a million strong”), but too often they get divided over political direction and wedge issues. Perhaps, the most divisive debates are between conservative Democrats, who vote with Republicans on certain wedge issues, and progressive Democrats, who want to directly challenge the growing right-wing political juggernaut in the state. The conservatives might see it as them against the outspoken leftists in the party. The progressives might see it as them against the Dinos, or Democrats in name only.

This argument is impossible to reconcile, but it is always worth the debate. The problem is we cannot let this debate or ongoing dialogue—and it will go on and on—or other arguments divide us. All nationwide indicators show the Democratic Party is on a staggering rise. The party’s major presidential candidates, for example, are raising far more money than their Republican counterparts. Imperial President George Bush’s approval rating is plummeting even in Oklahoma. U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe’s approval ratings are also down. People are going to want a change in 2008.

Meanwhile, the ODP still faces a debt it accrued trying to get Brad Carson elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004. Carson lost the race to the goofy Tom Coburn, who has embarrassed Oklahoma for the past three years with his outrageous comments and his weird political stunts. Carson ran as a conservative Democrat to the chagrin of progressives here, but that was in 2004 when Bush still had coattails. The political landscape in 2008 will be considerably different.

The reality is simply this: Democrats united behind their leading candidate in a U.S. Senate race, went into debt to support him, and he lost. There is no shame in that. We should pull together and pay off this debt right now.

The national Democrats—under Howard Dean’s 50-state strategy—are helping to fund the state party here, according to Holmes, who is not taking a salary. In addition, Blue Oklahoma, another local blog I operate, recently received a small grant to pay for its hosting fees from the progressive organization, Blogpac, which is an offshoot of this philosophy. As some of you might have noticed, the national Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is even running targeted ads on the site now.

All of this means the national Democrats are really making a concerted effort to help us out here in red states, and so we need to network and get busy. The foundation is set so we can show the nation in 2008 that Oklahoma has a viable Democratic Party.

(Click here to donate a few dollars to help the Oklahoma Democratic Party.)

("If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?"

"Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives. It is so painful to me to know that I bought into this system for so many years and Casey paid the price for that allegiance. I failed my boy and that hurts the most."--Cindy Sheehan)

One can only hope Oklahoma Democrats continue to embrace the interconnectivity and community philosophy of the netroots now that Ivan Holmes has become the party’s chairperson.

(You can find the image to the right and other great stuff at PhotoTune.)

The party’s outgoing chairperson, Lisa Pyror, made some efforts in this direction with an electronic newsletter and a party blogspot.com blog, but most of the published material was press release fluff or simply informational. It was pretty much old-school content in a new-school format.

If it sounds like I’m criticizing, well, yeah I’m criticizing, but I’m also urging the new party leadership to do much more with the Internet. The party blog, for example, should be bigger and better, and it should consistently link to and comment on the state’s progressive blogs. It should contain arguments and positions. It should go after the Republican opposition. We also need more progressive blogs in communities throughout Oklahoma. Could the Oklahoma Democratic Party help make this happen?

Holmes, who ran Labor Commissioner Lloyd Fields campaign in 2006, has been quoted as saying he wants to grow the grassroots and, by extension, I hope he means the netroots, but then this is something easy to say and difficult to do.

Here are some looming questions:

(1) How do you reconcile the state party’s true progressives and the conservative Dinos? For example, there are many of us here—real progressives—who were one hundred percent right about the Iraq debacle from the very beginning. Why are we still marginalized by the so-called centrists (really, they are center-rightist) in our own party?

(2) How can Democrats recruit people to run for legislative office, especially in rural areas? The state represents a basic structural problem for Democrats. As population growth stagnates in rural areas, they become more conservative for a variety of reasons. One thing Democrats could do is promote family farms over corporate farms as part of a healthy food initiative in the state.

(3) How can Democrats here start to stand for something? Now is the time to take stock. Can we not find three simple ideas to get behind? Better wages. Better health care. Better schools.

(4) How can Democrats raise a lot more money? The netroots could help. We also need to attract more national money, but we can only do this if the progressive wing of the state party is allowed a voice.

(5) What can be done to elect more Democrats to our U.S. Congressional delegation? U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe is currently hosting fundraisers with the vice president in his reelection bid, while Democrats don’t even have an announced candidate yet.

(6) What can be done to cultivate among Democrats an aggressive winning attitude rather than the current appease-the-center-don’t-make-any-voter-mad stance? Look, you’re going to make some voters mad when you speak the truth in the George Bush era of The Big Lie. But that doesn’t mean you will necessarily lose elections.

The 2008 elections right now look like a Democratic sweep on the level of the GOP’s 1980 sweep, the beginning of the so-called and over-hyped Reagan Revolution. Will the Oklahoma Democratic Party, which, really, may actually just be the understood mole-division of the Oklahoma Republican Party these days, get left behind?